fryd

And how about the fact that 2 of the best FACTORY Porsche drivers were driving an Audi P1 this year! What a joke. What a whitewash.

Great for Pugeot is all there's good to say about it.

bgiere

I really believe that Dr. W dislikes motorsports and is slowly whittling away at the racing spirit. The good news is that after the latest debacle he may not be in office for long...

A.Wayne

True about Piech , but Weideking ?

Weideking did not pick sub standard Drivers and managers to run their race program . Porsche is currently building better cars than they ever did , nothing to do with the tools, they need to step up their race personnel......

I bet they will ....

schwank

I know we are all fans of the 911, but I too believe they need to review their approach. If they can't be competitive with the 997 for whatever reasons... stop crippling the Cayman, put in a 3.8 for homologation, and race it. They don't need to give it away to the public... make it a premium car with limited numbers to meet the rules. Stop limiting an obviously solid platform and let it evolve into the capacity it has been engineered to.

The Panamera and the derivatives trading is a clear sign that the Porsche I have loved since I was a wee lad has lost their way. I still love the cars, but I am not a fan of the company as they currently exist.

cobrien

Agree with all your points, but Wolf did have a drive at Le Mans....he was in the #77 Felbermayer-Proton RSR which qualified 2nd in GT2.

hacker-pschorr

Just for ****s and grins, Porsche should find some way to dust off a 962 for LMP1

Maybe the new master company will re-vamp the R15 with a gas Porsche motor for LMP1 - like the Bentley Speed 8.

IMO it's about time Ferrari produced a reliable GT class car. After dominating F1 for a decade, they should have been kicking *** in the GT class in the late 90's already.


Porsche is a mess right now. They are spending more time and $$$ developing the Panamera and updates on the SUV.
I find it interesting the people scratching their heads at the current state of Porsche motorsports are some of the same people cringing at VW taking over.
Audi / VW running Porsche will be the best move for Porsche Motorsports. Porsche should be winning overall at LeMans, or at least on the podium every year, like Ferrari is to F1 (well, not this season).

wanna911

I don't know that I agree with these statements. It seems Porsche just didn't take Lemans very seriously. If you look at ALMS it seems like they throw the kitchen sink at it to win. And as far as reliability, the fastest cars (Porsches) have CRASHED out the last two Lemans races. I don't know how reliable a car should be when it crashes. And the cut tire the Lizards suffered isn't reliablity IMO. The only failure was the Felbemayer car with a fuel pump issue. The last compeitive car left just wasn't a serious effort.

It was just a poor effort, like it was last year. They thought bringing the fastest cars to the race, which they did, would win the race, and it didn't. The car shouldn't be blamed for stupid errors like last year, and poor efforts like this year.

mooty

amen.
up to 175k for a cayman cub car.

Meister Fahrer

I like Darren Law, but in hindsight it would have been better to have a Van Overbeek or Long or someone else with Le Mans experience.

I'll bet Law is beside himself crashing the car on his outlap.

Actually I think Audi should be more embarassed than Porsche, seems like the new R15 was not ready for prime time.
But I give Peugeot credit, their cars were ready -- but hey it took them 3 years to get it right.

Porsche is fine, Wiedeking will be gone soon enough, that conservative arschloch.
Just need to see some future focus whether it's the Qatar consortium $$, or VW takes them under the wing....

333pg333

Who knows what might happen on the horizon????
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/18/20090609...h-5268574.html

wanna911

Ferrari had a better game plan, they didn't care too much about qualifying, just wanted to be towards the front and run consistently the whole race. And that's what they did. Well executed game plan. Risi has taken their only car with a serious driver lineup to Lemans two years in a row and ran like clockwork while Porsche taken 3-4 over that same period of time and come away with jack, and with faster cars both times. Maybe this will be the wakeup call for them to take Lemans more seriously.


On a side note, maybe Ferrari should promote their GT2 strategist to F1. LOL

tetzlafh

Well it has been said before, If and when Porsche enters Le Mans as a factory team they are in to win it at the top otherwise they don't want to just jump in and race until they get the results like Peugeot.

RSR's have no issues with speed or reliability, look at the hardest 24 hour race the Nuerburgring 24 hours. Manthey racing has 'factory' support with drivers and motor sport techs.

Spyderidol

Couldn't agree more with you Doc! It was a disgraceful exhibition by the Porsche teams (and car). Wendy should be ashamed!
Wolf Henzler did in fact have a ride in the #77 Felbermayr car, but it only lasted 24 laps. That car was the only hope Porsche had in the GT2 as it had a fully professional driver line-up (Henzler, Lieb, Leitz) and that could compete with the dancing donkeys factory driven cars.

Spyderidol

I'm afraid I can't agree with you.
VAG has developed Audi to become their Motorsport brand. Porsche would play second fiddle to Audi in the VAG group.
Just look how VAG has insisted on the LMP1 diesel Audi (having heavily influenced the ACO in the pro-diesel regulations) and now they have introduced the R8 into GT3 in order to compete directly with the 997 Cup cars.
VAG have invested far too much money in the Audi racing program (and reap huge marketing benefits -especially in the US- from their program) to give up on it now.

Potomac-Greg

I think Audi wishes they had some of the old-school drivers who managed to keep their cars on track!

I don't think VAG is going to push Audi ahead of Porsche as the racing marque. It just doesn't sell Audis in the showroom, while racing clearly sells Porsches.

I think it's the inevitable ebb and flow of marketing dollars. A brand spends a bunch of money to buy prominence in a series, sustains it for a few years, and then lets it fade. Unfortunately, I think Porsche and Audi have picked this time period to let it fade.

I doubt Peugeot is going to keep investing in P1 as it has now that they have their big win; and how long can Ferrari maintain it's investment level in GT2?

2010 and 2011 could be an opportunity for independents and dedicated race brands to make a showing. Go Spyker!